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Carol Ann Duffy and Friends

On the publication of her final collection as poet laureate, Carol Ann Duffy appears at Southbank Centre’s London Literature Festival reading with friends.

Imtiaz Dharker, Mark Pajak and Keith Hutson join Duffy for the event to share their poetry.

Duffy reads from Sincerity, her final publication in her 10-year term as poet laureate. The collection is a moving and disarming reflection on loss and remembrance.

Duffy is professor and creative director of the Writing School at Manchester Metropolitan University. She has written for both children and adults, and her poetry has received many awards, including the Signal Prize for Children’s Verse, the Whitbread, Forward and TS Eliot Prizes, and the Lannan and EM Forster Prize in America. She was appointed poet laureate in 2009.

Keith Hutson has written for Coronation Street and many well-known comedians, and his poetry has been widely-published in journals internationally. Competition successes include the Troubadour, the York Literature, and the Wordsworth Trust. Keith’s debut pamphlet, Routines, was published in 2016 by Poetry Salzburg, where he is now a co-editor.

Imtiaz Dharker is a poet, artist and documentary filmmaker. Awarded the Queen’s Gold Medal for Poetry in 2014, she has received the Cholmondeley Award and an Honorary Doctorate from SOAS. Her collections include Postcards from God, The Terrorist at My Table and her latest, Luck Is the Hook. She has exhibited drawings in India, London, New York and Hong Kong, and scripts and directs films for non-government organisations working for women and children in India.

Mark Pajak’s work has appeared in The London Review of Books, Poetry London, The North, The Rialto and Magma. He has been commended in the National Poetry Competition, awarded first place in The Bridport Prize and received a Northern Writers' Award, an Eric Gregory Award and an UNESCO international writing residency. His first pamphlet, Spitting Distance, was selected by Carol Ann Duffy as a Laureate’s Choice